By AWizardInDallas on 11/6/2008 6:37 PM

I'm closing this blog today due to player availablity issues related to his crudy job with a crudy work schedule.  We all sympathize.  Anyway we did finished the module successfully as noted in the blog.  I had planned to continue the campaign with some expanded material that will now be used in a future campaign.

By AWizardInDallas on 4/11/2008 11:31 PM

The Sunless Citadel continues!

Our intrepid band climbed down into the darkness to explore the lower level of the Sunless Citadel once again. Thorne was the first to descend and was immediately attacked by twig blights. He whipped out his twin long swords and started hacking as bow fire helped with the defeat of the malignant blights. They explored the large lower chamber only to find quiet at each of three doors. They made their way back through the goblin lab, finding it still abandoned. Eventually they came to the huge gallery halls and headed through the door to the northern hexagonal room. Thorne opened the door unceremoniously to find lumbering skeletons in the room. They shambled slowly forward until Holly actually entered the room. They then leaped to the attack! The battle was desperate, Thorne taking the brunt of the attack with Holly and Stephen having taken enough damage to force them to withdraw. Shadow healed her fellows with the wand of curing given to her by the mysterious wizard, Palomere (via the healer in Oakhurst). Fortunately, though the battle was close no one succumbed to their wounds.

By AWizardInDallas on 11/4/2007 11:58 PM

The journey from the half-burned-down barn between Oakhurst and the Sunless Citadel was uneventful except for a light morning rain that continued on into the afternoon.  The fellowship was somewhat drenched on their approach to the ravine leading into the complex, but none the worse for wear.  Investigating the area, they made note of a few recent camp fires (within the last two weeks) near the outer edges of the ravine.  The weather had fouled any tracks, however.  Shadow too noticed that the rope they'd once used to lower themselves into the ravine, to a platform below, was missing.  Had someone cut it down to make entrance into the Citadel more difficult?  No one could really say.  Nevertheless after a brief exchange of ropes and a few quick knots, the fellowship easily replaced the missing rope and repelled down into the ravine, dropping this time to the top-most platform overlooking the remains of the fallen structure.  All seemed quiet in the dark depths below.

Thorne took the lead down the long switchback stairs that would take them to the now-familiar entrance into the crumbling structure.  Little seemed to have changed after the brief time they'd been away from the crumbling place once occupied by dragon cultists.  The stairs were still rubble strewn, though easy to navigate.  There appeared to be no dire rats this time, though Thorne soon noticed the presence of three twig blights feeding on the fresh bodies of goblins on the parapet below.  Shadow lit the platform with a flaming arrow and a brief battle ensued.  The blights were easily dispatched, mostly with bow fire.  One of the small tree creatures had even conveniently fallen into a pit trap blocking the door, allowing the elves to pepper it with arrows from on high, whilst still on the stairwell.  Holly had a second chance to view more dea ... Read More »

By AWizardInDallas on 11/4/2007 9:52 PM

Shadow and Thorne sat with Erky in the tap room of the Ol' Boar Inn in Oakhurst.  Shadow seemed to be contemplating their path ahead whilst sharing a bowl of boiled eggs with Thorne.  He munched on crispy toast and fatback bacon, swilling down ale with gusto.  Shadow too found it pleasant not to be eating trail rations for a change.  Still, they both knew that the Sunless Citadel had claimed too many lives for their comfort.  Shadow and Thorne also knew that only they two were insufficient to face whatever continued to lurk in the darkness down the old road.  That and the very thought of admitting defeat seemed to trouble at least Shadow.

They had also not yet accepted the gnome Milo into their fellowship.  His begging to join them in whatever endeavors lie ahead seemed to have had the opposite effect.  One thing else was certain.  Erky Timbers didn't favor his brother any more than they did.  Still, they were now very short-handed.

Erky sat sullenly near Shadow, clearly with some trouble on his mind as well.  He had earlier insisted that he would find his way home with the next traders that came through Oakhurst.  Erky was leaving and yet Shadow wondered at his mood.  He certainly had Milo and the fouled relationship with his father on his mind but he should have been happy to have been freed from goblin captivity and now looking forward to the prospect of returning home to his wife and children.  He broke the silence.  "Shadow, I have a favor to ask," he said at last.  "I'm not sure I can make the journey home alone and would like to ask that you and Thorne come with me."

Shadow had wondered whether the gnome could make it home on his own.  She halted though, noting the eavesdropping of a young Halfling at the ... Read More »

By AWizardInDallas on 10/3/2007 10:01 AM

Yes, with the death of Thamior the fellowship decided to return to Oakhurst. Erky Timbers had spent a year in chains, a prisoner of goblins. He'd chosen to fight alongside the fellowship to gain a measure of payback. Having accomplished that he now expressed a desire to return to the sunlit world and the loving arms of his wife and children as well. Who could blame him? So, finding the halls of the Sunless Citadel as quiet as a tomb, they made their way out unopposed. They walked the road in uncomfortable silence, wondering if twig blights still roamed the land and whether they'd meet any. Surprisingly, they did not. Returning to town, they rested and healed and handled adventurer business.

Yet they were uncertain as to whether they had at last defeated the Sunless Citadel. Shadow, conscious of Palomere's warning that a deeper threat lay beneath the citadel, contemplated the notion of once more adding numbers to their fellowship. She also had a task. She took upon herself the unhappy burden of informing Kerowyn Hucrele about the death of her kin. Talgen Hucrele had met his fate with the goblins and hobgoblins; they'd found the chieftain wearing his signet ring. Sharwyn Hucrele had most certainly met with a worse fate, enslaved as she was to the Gulthias tree. Retrieval of her signet ring came at the price of freeing her from bondage to the vampric tree. Sir Braford, a friend of the Hucrele family, had likewise been set free from the tree. Leaving the Hucrele matron with two signet rings and her tears, Shadow returned to the Ol' Boar Inn to contemplate what to do next.

Will Shadow decide to return to the Sunless Citadel? It had after all claimed the lives of many companions: Treecko (halfling druid enslaved to the Gulthias tree), Shawn (missing in action), Thamior (killed by a swarm of stirges), Gilraen (killed by twig blights fighting the wicked druid, Belak the Outcast). Shawn too was still missing, ru ... Read More »